MCGD: Rotations

Laboratory Rotations

Students must rotate in at least three labs during the academic year.

The above-mentioned rotation cycles are firm!

Lab rotations must be conducted in the laboratories of investigators affiliated with the BBS or on a training grant affiliated with the BBS. Please consult the BBS website for those who are members. Not all lab PI’s are members of the BBS.

Each rotation will be a minimum of 5 weeks in duration.  Some rotations may be extended and should be coordinated directly with rotation advisor. For example, the second lab rotation officially ends on Friday, November 20^th.  At the student’s request, the second rotation could be lengthened and end on Friday, December 18^th, when the winter recess commences.

Students will register for three of the five rotation courses and give talks on a rotation project at the corresponding set of rotation talks at the end of each term. The additional slots allow for flexibility should an individual lab or student need to delay a rotation or if the circumstances of the ongoing pandemic dictate that the campus return to a temporary closure.   If a student does not find a lab in the first 3 rotations, they can do additional rotations to identify a laboratory. Instruction and practice for the rotation talks will occur in the MCDB 900/901 research course.

Although hands-on research is the goal of lab rotations the pandemic and social distancing requirements may make such experiences infeasible.

The training should allow students to:

1. experience the mentoring style of the PI and the lab members;
2. understand the research questions that the lab addresses; and
3. learn the research methods that the lab employs.

In-person experiences will be supplemented with remote lab meetings, journal clubs, and other lab-based discussions where possible.

PIs are expected to develop a plan that meets guidelines for physical distancing, PPE use and de-densification of labs, ideally in consultation with lab members. Schedules should take the needs of individual trainees into consideration. For example, a trainee who relies on shuttle transportation will not be scheduled for time in the lab when shuttles are not running. For information on laboratory safety planning please refer to Yale’s Research Reactivation website.   https://research.yale.edu/phase-2-research-reactivation

If safety allows, the student should aim to learn experimental procedures by working in the lab. The rotation talks will address both conceptual understanding of the research question and technical understanding of the experimental approaches.

Students should balance the time devoted to rotations and to course work, allowing time for lab work every week but not spending so much time in lab that course work suffers.

The Track administration asks students to confirm their lab rotation choices by sending the Track registrar an email at least one week prior to the start of each rotation if possible. 

A student who finds early in the rotation (within the first weeks) that his/her choice of lab is unsatisfactory is encouraged to discuss possible remedies with the DGS and/or Track registrar.

Students may join a thesis lab upon completing the minimum of three lab rotations and will not be required to wait until the end of the spring semester to join a lab.

Lab rotations are evaluated and students are given a copy of the evaluation for their records.